The Real Truth About Social Media Metrics

Recently, I launched a brand-new video podcast called Jay Today. I upload a new, 3-minute video every business day, where I talk about social media, content marketing, business and life. It’s a way for me to talk about what’s in my head RIGHT NOW.
JayToday is available on Youtube, iTunes (as a video podcast), and at JayToday.tv. The show is sponsored by Sprout Social (which I use for my social media), and Candidio (a great video editing service).
Here’s a Jay Today video where I tell you the truth about social media metrics.

Today I did an interview with a reporter who was asking me about social networks and metrics for social media, the kind of metrics that brands should care about in social media. She said, “You know, we should get beyond Likes and Follows and things like that, right?”
And I said, “Well, yes, of course we should because the goal is not to be good at social media. The goal is to be good at business because of social media.” (click to tweet)
So there are a number of things that you can measure in social media in terms of traffic to your website, lead generation, sales, and propensity to promote. One of the best social media metrics is to do a Net Promoter Score study of your customers and then do a separate Net Promoter Score study of customers who are connected to the brand and social media and see if there is a difference there, see if there is a lift there.
You can look at propensity to order. You can look at average order size. If you’re smart at database marketing and understanding who your customers are and how they buy from you, there’s all kinds of business level metrics that you can measure in social media.

We Have Plenty of Social Media Metrics

The problem in social media isn’t that it’s not measurable. It’s that we have too many metrics. But the metrics that we have at our disposal, the metrics that are easy to find, the metrics that you can just press a button and run a report, the metrics that Facebook and Twitter and LinkedIn and Pinterest and Instagram give you natively just scratch the surface of actual business value.
Here’s a truth for you. Insights require effort always. Insights always require effort. You know why most people struggle with social media metrics? It’s because, as my friend Tom Webster and my friend Chuck Hemann say, “They don’t want to do the work.” Insights require effort. If you really want to know what the impact of social media is on your business, you’re going to have to do something other than hit Print. You’re going to have to figure out how to track from backwards, track the value of social media to your business level outcome.
It’s absolutely doable, but it’s not easy. You can’t have it both ways. You can’t have reports and have easy.

Sprout Social Shout-out to Chuck Hemann

Speaking of Chuck and Tom, today’s Sprout Social shoutout is to Chuck Hemann. Chuck’s the Head of Analytics at GolinHarris. He lives in Dallas now. Chuck’s a fantastic guy, super smart, great guy to follow on social media. He’s also the coauthor of a book I really recommend, called “Digital Marketing Analytics.” If you want to go deep on how to measure social media and other forms of digital marketing and do it right, you should pick up that book, “Digital Marketing Analytics” from my friend Chuck Hemann.

Get More Jay Today

Feedback on the new show has been great – especially the snackable length. I would be so honored if you watched the episode above and/or some others. I’d love your thoughts too!
JayToday is available on Youtube, iTunes (as a video podcast), and at JayToday.tv.
Here is another show from last week about how relevancy creates time.